42 seconds too slow

On Friday morning, I ran my first 10K race, the "Speedy Spaniard" in Spanish Fork. I've run the distance a handful of times before, but there's nothing like the adrenaline rush of doing an actual race. Usually when I go longer distances (5 miles or more) I'm pretty happy with myself if I can keep my pace close to 10 minutes per mile, so in order to push myself with this 10K, I wanted to see if I could do it in under 60 minutes.

Paul was going to run the race with me. He was all registered and everything, and we all spent the night at my in-laws so that we could leave early in the morning (the race STARTED at 6:30) and let the kids just stay asleep. On Thursday night, Paul was complaining that his stomach was hurting, thinking something wasn't right with the sandwich he ate for dinner, but it ended up being more than that. Pretty much ALL night he was getting up to use the bathroom and throw up. When he finished throwing up for the 4th time at 4:30, I told him he shouldn't do the race, since we'd be getting up in an hour to get over there. Neither of us got good sleep that night.

When it was time to get going, Paul did get ready in his running gear and drove me over to the start of the race. He was figuring he could just run a slower pace with me and be okay, but ultimately didn't want to risk a gastric attack at either end! Thankfully, my friend from the ward, Tina, was also doing the race and she and I stuck together for the entire 6.2 miles. She's the reason why I ended up doing as well as I did, seeing as I kept having to catch up to her before she could pull away from me. Last year, Tina completed the race in under 58 minutes, so I was hoping we could accomplish something close to that.

As with most races for me, the first 2 miles were comfortable, and by the end of the 3rd mile, I was fine, but ready to be done. Up until this race, I usually AM done at the end of 3 miles! Mile 4 was a little slower and I took a "GU" which helped. By the time I finished mile 5, I was mentally freaking out, but with the help of some rockin' tunes on my ipod, I made it through another 1/2 mile. With .75 of a mile to go, Tina kicked it into gear and I wanted to scream at her, but continued to push through. We FINALLY got to the park that held the finish line, but I didn't realize we had to run all the way around it! I turned one corner, and had to yell, "WHERE IS IT?!" I'm surprised I didn't throw a good "DAMMIT" at the end of that question, because I know I wanted to! After turning that last corner, I could see that the timer said 1:00:10 and I was a little disappointed, but what can you do!? So, I said, "oh well" and ran as fast as I could to that dang finish line!

So, my time ended up being 60:41, which isn't too shabby at all. It was just 42 seconds slower than I wanted it to be! At least I can say that I didn't leave anything out there on the course. I think I really did give it everything I had, so with that being said, how can I be disappointed!? This race was the fastest I've ever run 6.2 miles, so I'm definitely pleased! I'm bummed that Paul wasn't able to run with me, but on a happy note, he'd given a friend of his from Spanish Fork his race number (since the friend hadn't actually registered for the race), and his number ended up winning 18 holes of golf in the raffle! So, the $19 registration fee for Paul wasn't wasted after all! If his friend hadn't run the race with Paul's number on, it wouldn't have been entered into the raffle in the first place. So that was cool!

Anyway, it turned out to be a fun little event for me to participate in, even if Tina and those 6.2 miles kicked my butt! The rest of the day was spent being lazy with a frequently interrupted nap and reading the John Adams biography. We had dinner at the Croshaw's and just hung out til it got dark. Hope everyone had a very happy Pioneer Day!